Hansen frowned. “You’re kidding me.”
Fisher shook his head and sighed.
Ames’s smile broadened. Good old Sam Fisher couldn’t see the forest for the trees. The damned bad guy had been right in front him. The same guy who’d pulled off the weapons heist in the first place was the guy orchestrating the auction. No brainer, Sammy boy. It was the introduction of the banker that made the plot seem larger, when, in fact, it was all quite simple. And Zahm was just the kind of maniac to push things over the top. He never knew when to quit, and never, ever, had enough… of anything.
“Where is he now?” Fisher asked.
Ames grinned and shrugged. “Around.”
Hansen glanced at him emphatically. “You can still do the right thing.”
“I could,” Ames agreed, “but I won’t.”
He’d already pulled the pin on the grenade and let it slip from his hands. In the same instant, he sprinted back up the ramp, even as he knew they were swinging around, bringing their rifles to bear on him.
The explosion echoed up from the level below, and Hansen, along with the others, was on his belly as the corridor reverberated and a sulfurlike stench wafted their way.
“We gotta tag the last of the cases,” cried Fisher, which meant they were going down, not up, to escape.
“Gonna be trapped,” Hansen told him.
Fisher answered in a deadpan: “Bad luck for us.” Then he turned to Noboru. “You have the ARWEN?”
“Yeah.”
Fisher spoke in a rapid fire. He told Noboru that the initial counterattack would come from the medical zone, where Hansen had spotted the attendees. Zahm had most assuredly placed some of his guards near and around them. As soon as Noboru heard them moving, he was to put two gas canisters downrange. Valentina and Hansen would back him; then they would leapfrog down to level 4, split up, and make a last sweep of the zones for the rest of the arsenal.
With wide eyes, Fisher wished them all good luck, then took off with Gillespie. They would hold the ramp intersection, while Hansen, Noboru, and Valentina made their sweep.
Once they reached the medical zone, Noboru set up about fifty feet from the twin main doors leading to the makeshift barracks. He clutched the ARWEN tightly and gave Hansen a quick nod: good to go.
One door shifted open and Noboru fired, the gun echoing with a
Hansen, who had tucked himself tightly against the wall, steadied his rifle, ready to unleash his first salvo, while Noboru stood ready once more with the ARWEN. He had a five-shot capacity in the weapon’s rotary drum.
The doors slammed open, and through the smoke, a pair of gunmen appeared, AK-47s held high. With a grunt and thump, Noboru express-mailed another gas canister.
At the same time, Hansen and Valentina sent their first wave of automatic fire punching through the veils of smoke. The two guys dropped like drunken frat brothers. He and Valentina couldn’t see much after that, but they didn’t need to because Fisher’s plan was already working. They kept firing, and farther back, Hansen stole a second’s glimpse of two more men hitting the floor. Four down.
Valentina abruptly charged toward those doors and took cover on the left side. Hansen gave her a look that said,
With bug eyes, she came racing toward them, screaming, “Time to rock and roll!”
Hansen exchanged a look of surprise with Noboru as they dropped in behind her. Call that the Valentina Day Massacre. A heartbeat later, one of the doors blew off its hinges behind them. But what was worse, somewhere down below echoed the sound of more gunfire. As he ran, Hansen spoke into his headset, telling Fisher they were on their way.
They were out of the corridor in thirty seconds and reached the main ramp to head down. Below they spotted Fisher, who nodded to Hansen, then jammed his rifle around the corner and fired two shots.
Hansen led them down to Fisher’s position, and there Noboru dropped to a knee and aimed the ARWEN back up the ramp.
There was a sudden change of plans. Fisher now wanted Hansen and Valentina to clear medical. Noboru would hold the ramp. Fisher and Gillespie went charging off to ballistics, where Gillespie thought she’d heard Ames shouting at someone.
Gillespie was about a hundred yards down the corridor, running just ahead of Fisher, when she heard Ames’s voice again: “Shouldn’t have left it sitting here alone, Chucky.”
And then came another voice, presumably Zahm’s, given the British accent: “Aw, bloody hell, you little weasel! Come down here so I can put a bullet in your brain!”
“Can’t do that, Chucky!”
“Don’t call me Chucky!”
They reached sight of the main door into ballistics, level 4, then peeked around the corner. Similar to the zones above, the level was cavernous, like a stadium with a stone roof, and lined with engine test stands and ancient-looking tractors and treads for moving the heavy motors. Fisher raised his binoculars and saw that Zahm was at the far end of the zone with two men. They were near the mouth of the center blast funnel, near the last collection of Anvil cases. He told Gillespie to keep her eyes sharp for Ames. He was in there somewhere, and, she figured, had probably been double-crossed by Zahm, which was why he was still around and possibly about to exact his revenge on the self-appointed auctioneer as well as his best buddies in Third Echelon.
She and Fisher moved past the door and crept over to the nearest workbench. She took point and immediately found a covering position, while he eased in beside her. She got her first look at Zahm, a tall and stocky character with a thick shock of wavy hair. He was probably about Fisher’s age, though his hair was suspiciously devoid of gray. He wore a dark green turtleneck with suede patches on the shoulders.
Zahm lifted his voice. “Give it up, Ames! You won’t get ’em open!”
“Don’t want to!” Ames answered, his voice emanating from somewhere above.
“What’s he doing?” she whispered to Fisher.
“Don’t know.”
The others checked in over the headset. Noboru had heard the remaining guys moving around, trying to call the elevator. Fisher told him to hold position and that they had Zahm and what was left of the arsenal. This wasn’t exactly the original plan, but they’d take it. Hansen would clear weapons and electronics, ensuring no surprise attacks for their escape; then he would rally back at Noboru’s position. Valentina would do likewise.
With that, Fisher gestured to Gillespie, and they hustled off, working their way between the shelves and equipment, the vehicles and engine parts, keeping low and tight to the corners, advancing fluidly like two lethal components controlled by a single brain.
The strangest sensation washed over Gillespie, and she found it hard, for a moment, to concentrate. There was something incredibly sexy, even erotic, about darting through the shadows with him, the threat of being caught reinforced by every footfall. When they paused at the next bench, she just looked at him, in awe, and he looked at her: What? She just shuddered and mouthed, “I’m okay.”
They came within a hundred yards of Zahm and his two men. He gave her the hand signal to take the man on the left. She nodded. Set up. Took aim. The Groza felt perfect in her hands. Groza means “thunder.” Oh, yeah, she was about to deliver her thunder…
They would do it just like training. She waited for his shot. The instant she heard it, she squeezed the trigger. Her target could not react in time.
Both of Zahm’s men dropped. One, two. Textbook head shots.
The man himself spun away, but Fisher was already running toward him. “Hi, Chuck.”
Gillespie dropped in beside Fisher.
